Wolfowitz under fire after partner receives promotion and pay rise

Paul Wolfowitz, the former Bush administration hawk whose name is indelibly linked to the invasion of Iraq, has provoked a bureaucratic war in his current job of president of the World Bank after it emerged yesterday that his romantic partner had received a promotion and a number of large pay rises.

The new job and increases for Shaha Ali Riza, a communications officer at the World Bank who was seconded to the US state department soon after Mr Wolfowitz's arrival, took her annual salary to $193,590 (£98,520) from $132,660, making her better paid than the secretary of state, Condoleezza Rice.

The rise for Ms Riza has stirred resentment among the bank's 13,000 employees, where there has already been grumbling of cronyism after Mr Wolfowitz appointed a number of former Bush administration allies to important posts. The bank's staff association said the rise flouted employee guidelines. "The staff association has been inundated with messages from staff expressing concern, dismay and outrage," an email from the association said this week. The email called on the board of the bank to explain the increases.

Ms Riza, who is of Libyan and Saudi parentage and was raised in Tunisia and educated in Britain, has been romantically linked with Mr Wolfowitz since 2001 when he separated from his wife of 30 years.

At the time of his appointment, she was working as a communications officer in the bank's department of Middle Eastern and North African affairs.

Bank regulations prohibit spouses or partners from working in the same area. Although Mr Wolfowitz disclosed the relationship when he arrived at the bank, he initially asked if Ms Riza could keep her job and work with him as long as he removed himself from decisions involving her salary. The request angered colleagues, the New Yorker reported this week.

Ms Riza was eventually given a job at the state department under Liz Cheney, the daughter of the vice-president, promoting democracy in the Middle East. She was also moved up to a managerial pay grade in compensation for the disruption to her career. The staff association claims that the pay rise was more than double the amount allowed under employee guidelines.

"The staff association has not been able to determine who approved the terms of the external assignment. We have been able to verify that they are grossly out of line with the rules," the email said.

It is the latest run-in between Mr Wolfowitz and bank employees - 90% of whom opposed his appointment, arguing he would turn the bank into an instrument of the Bush administration's neoconservative policies.

The bank did not respond to requests for comment.

Since the furore generated by his appointment Mr Wolfowitz has earned admiration for his seriousness about corruption, although there has been anger too at his unilateral and ad-hoc approach to dealing with such issues. Last year, Mr Wolfowitz halted lending to Chad after the government announced an increase in military spending. In 2005, he withheld an aid package for Uzbekistan when the government used violence to put down an uprising, killing 700 people.

However, within the bank, such bold moves have been viewed alongside a number of contentious appointments he has made, including Republican loyalist Suzanne Rich Folsom leading the bank's internal anti-corruption unit over a field of about a dozen other candidates.

In its parting shot, the email from the staff association warned that the good governance Mr Wolfowitz had promoted among the bank's client countries should be observed internally. "Good governance is founded in a respect for rule of law, transparency and accountability. In order to be credible, senior management must model the behaviour it espouses."

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About this article

Wolfowitz under fire after partner receives promotion and pay rise

This article was published on
the Guardian website
at 07.27 EDT on Saturday 7 April 2007.
It was last modified at 05.02 EDT on Wednesday 1 October 2014.
It was first published at 07.27 EDT on Thursday 17 May 2007.